


In Tazmagor

by Odyle



Category: Abarat Series - Clive Barker
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-12-21
Updated: 2011-12-21
Packaged: 2017-10-27 16:52:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,047
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/297990
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Odyle/pseuds/Odyle
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>AU from Absolute Midnight - The true impact of Candy's separation from Princess Boa becomes more apparent.</p>
            </blockquote>





	In Tazmagor

**Author's Note:**

  * For [tristesses](https://archiveofourown.org/users/tristesses/gifts).



> Thank you to my beta who is made of sunshine, joy, and the entire song catalog of the Rolling Stones.
> 
> This story is an AU from about 200 pages into the third book. It takes liberties with the canon presented in the third book. To be quite honest, I'm still processing the third book. Also, I apologize if you hate Gazza.

She went down to the docks with Malingo early to watch the fishermen bring out the fish for sale. These being Arabatian fish, they were enormous and brightly colored. Candy pocketed a scale that came off of one morose looking orange fish as large as a small car. The scale was translucent and flexible. It didn't smell at all like fish, but instead like a warm sea breeze.

"What's the plan?" Malingo asked. They stood arm in arm. Although it was nine in the morning, as it had always been, it felt earlier. Candy leaned on him, resting her head on his shoulder as they watched the fishermen lay out a jelly fish that almost looked like it was made our of taffeta for display.

"I don't have one," Candy said.

And she didn't. She had yet to be struck by a brilliant idea or a reckless impulse she couldn't help but to obey. They needed to be out doing things to save Abarat, but Candy just felt tired. She had been freed of Boa and now she was empty. Her heart was lighter, but there was loneliness to being alone in her body. She was responsible for magic spells and brilliant plans to save all of Abarat going right. She, Candy Quackenbush from Chickentown, Minnesota, had the fate of Abarat on her shoulders. Yet even surrounded by her friends, she felt helpless. Candy hadn't realized how much Boa had been contributing until she was gone.

"Heroes always have a plan," Malingo said.

There was a hint of determination in his voice that it pained Candy to hear. She didn't want to disappoint him, but suspected it was an inevitability. After her encounter with Christopher Carrion in the alley, she'd tried to do magic. A simple glyph to prove to herself that Boa wasn't the one with all of the power. Candy hadn't even managed a glimmer. She'd forgotten the steps half way through. Ashamed, she'd covered up her work and gone to find everyone else.

 _What if I'm not capable of doing magic without Boa?_ she had wondered to herself. The thought had kept her up that night and the next.

"Hey, sleepy," Malingo said, shrugging his shoulders to wake Candy up. "You want something to eat?"

She rubbed her eyes. "Yeah, that'd be good."

Malingo scampered off into the crowded market, toward the line of food stands they’d passed coming in. Candy tried to pay attention to the dealings going on on the market floor while she waited on him, but the system of hand gestures the collected Abaratians used for bidding were impenetrable. It did not help that her mind couldn't focus for long without drifting to thoughts of Boa and emptiness and the fear.

The market place was a swirl of colors. Even with the state of politics as they were, the Arabatian sense of style had not been dampened. It might have been amplified, Candy thought to herself upon seeing someone wearing an almost pineapple shaped fish for a hat pass her by. When she happened to see a tall figure in a black robe on surveying the market crowd, it caught her attention. Candy stared at the man. It was brazen for him to come out into a place like this. Most people would know who he was, even if the had never laid eyes on him in their lives. Black was the most conspicuous color he could have chosen for such a place.

Candy checked that Malingo was out of sight before she fought her way through to the tall figure. As she drew near, she could tell that he was watching her as she had thought. She nodded to him and continued past, toward one of the fish lockers that had been emptied out earlier in the auction.

It was almost as if she could feel him following her. There was something about his presence that attracted her notice. When she felt the mood of people, of places, it was most often warm and frantic. The spots where he stood were outcroppings of sadness and misery. Never before had she met anyone else who washed over her with misery just by their very proximity. Other people were similar. Her mother and Malingo showed trust and love, and it made it easier to pick them out. Her father radiated anger. If anything, this was the easiest to locate.

He pulled closed the door to the fish locker behind himself.

"I'm glad that you've taken the time to talk to me," Carrion said.

He still wore his robe, the hood pulled down low over his head so she could not see his face. Candy couldn’t quite understand why. They were alone and she’d seen his face before. It wasn’t as if he’d scare her by showing it. He seemed better formed than he had been in the alley a week before.

"You deserve to be heard."

"I'm glad you feel that way. Maybe you will listen to what I have to say and consider."

“I promise to think about it.”

They stood in silence.

“I would like for you to come with me and be my apprentice.”

The thought that Christopher Carrion could help her had never crossed her mind. They had been enemies for so long and now he was only the shell of the man he had been. Candy wondered if he had any power to spare considering how much magic it must have cost him simply to keep his body bound together.

“You mean so you can teach me magic?”

“I am the only one who knows my grandmother’s ways. You will be the one to defeat her and I will do all that I can to help you.” He stopped to chuckle. In Candy’s ear, it sounded more like a death rattle. “To help you. That is the only reason I can come up with to explain why I still live. I’m meant to help you when I once tried to destroy you.”

“I don’t think that any of my friends would let you travel with us, let alone live long enough to teach me anything.”

“That is why you must leave them behind and come with me.”

There was a measure of sense in the proposal. Christopher Carrion had been the one to teach Princess Boa all that she knew. He had even taught her things beyond what Mrs. Munn knew. Candy was a human, not an Abaratian who could pick up magic if they had the slightest inclination.

"I don't know if I can even do magic anymore," Candy told him. It hurt to say, but he needed the truth. There was no need for any of this if she was no longer capable of magic.

"You can," Carrion said. "I can feel it near you. There is some essential spark about you. I do not know if it is the glow of the Hereafter surrounding you or if there is a piece of her left behind in you."

He said these last words softly, almost tenderly, if the word could ever be applied to his tone. It unsettled Candy to hear it.

"She's all gone, though maybe she left tracks behind."

Carrion shook his head.

“I don’t know if I can.”

“You said you would think about it. Give me an answer next time we meet. Learning magic may be the best way to help your friends and the only way to defeat Mater Motley. Promise me that you will consider my offer.”

“I promise,” Candy said.

Carrion opened the door. He nodded to her and then slipped back into the bright morning.

 

 

It seemed that everyone had some business to be about while in Tazmagor. Even the Johns excused themselves uncharacteristically early, claiming that they had appointments to keep. Most days it was just Malingo and Candy and Gazza. They would walk through the markets with Candy between them, almost as if they guarded her. Forgetting their impending doom was simple when she was with them. They could go from stall to stall, making jokes and horsing around as if they had no cares.

Malingo never tired of explaining what things were to Candy. She learned more of Abarat by listening to the geshrat describe the curious objects up for sale than she had in years of reading Klepp's Almanac.

Gazza was always ready to push through a crowd so they could get free. He would take her hand and lead the way, weaving between people until they were clear of the press of bodies. How competitive he got with Malingo made her laugh. She watched them wager for her attention. All they earned was her amusement, but seemed like enough for them.

Candy liked to forget. She didn't want to think about Mater Motley and her schemes or Carrion's proposition. Not once since she had come to Abarat had she been able to live like a normal person, not on the run.

She was sharing a purple fruit from the Nonce with Malingo and Gazza one day. There were workers building a spire nearby, in the line of buildings that defined the inland edge of the marketplace. Candy had been observing them, watching as the workers climbed the scaffolding with ease. They reminded her of the lizards her 6th grade science teacher, Mrs. Szarejko, had kept in her room. The bottoms of their toes were sticky, so they had liked to scaled the sides of their terrariums to sun their bellies directly before the sun lamp.

There were shrieks in the marketplace when the scaffolding began to collapse. Most of the workers were able to jump onto the incomplete spire or onto the surrounding roofs, but one was caught as the scaffolding buckled, leaving the man dangling over the market.

"We've got to do something," Malingo said and took off toward the man. Candy followed him, leaving Gazza with their lunch.

The criers had stopped in the whole marketplace's attention seemed focused on the man. One of his coworkers stepped onto the scaffolding in an attempt to save him, but it was no use. The metal screamed under his weight and he quickly stepped back.

"We can make a glyph," Malingo said.

Candy nodded. It would be the only way to get up to him fast enough.

“Come on, Candy. Help me,” Malingo said, straining to build the glyph as fast as he could on his own.

Candy tried to calm her mind and find the part of her that knew how to do this.

“I-I can’t.”

There was a crack of bones and skin against the cobblestones as the man came tumbling down. Malingo screwed his eyes shut and looked away. Candy couldn't help but watch. A cloth merchant hurried over with an assistant to cover the man with a length of canvas. They were bundling what remained of him onto a stretcher when Gazza put an arm around her and pulled her away from the scene.

 _If I had magic, I could have saved him._

The thought turned over and over in her mind. She could not look at Malingo or pass through the square where the accident occurred without thinking it.

 

 

Carrion was easy to find, Candy needed only to follow the shadows until she found him.

“Have you considered my offer?” Christopher Carrion asked.

The alleyway where she found him smelled foul. Either not all fish from Mama Izabella smelled like sea breezes or the breeze off her into Tazmagor smelled like fish. Candy pulled the collar of her shirt up over her nose to try to cut down on the smell which seemed not to bother Carrion.

“I have.”

“And what is your answer?”

Candy took a deep breath. She needed it to calm herself, but almost gagged from the stench.

“Please take me on as your apprentice,” she said quickly, then hid her nose beneath her shirt again.

 

 

When all of her companions had gone to sleep, so heavily mobbed by sleep that not even the snoring of the Johns woke them, Candy rose and packed her things.

She leaned down and gave Malingo a peck on the cheek. Candy hoped that he would understand. As things stood, she couldn’t help any of them. Things were in such disarray in her own mind. Carrion promised to relieve some of her confusion.

There wasn’t much to pack--a copy of Klepp’s Almanac and a necklace Malingo had given her. She owned only the clothes on her back and the shoes on her feet. It made adventuring easier, but packing less satisfying. She bundled the book and necklace in a kerchief she promised herself she was only borrowing from Two-Toed Tom. Candy hurried out into the afternoon with her package. In the constant crowds of the city, she was inconspicuous in her stroll down toward the docks.

The boat had been arranged. She’d ditched Malingo and the Johns in a crowd the day before and gone down to the docks. She found a man with a small skiff who’d been willing to part with it for a price she was sure Carrion could pay. They had agreed to meet again the next day so Carrion could pay the man and they could leave for the Yebba Dim Day.

Candy bought her last meal on the isle from one of the street vendors and walked slowly toward her appointment with Christopher Carrion enjoying the sights of the city. With people rushing about like this, it was almost as if all was right in the world of Abarat. No one seemed bothered by the threat of Mater Motley, nor did she see the first sign of the Commexco Kid.

Carrion met her in another alleyway. He was much better formed than he had been the last times she had seen him. His body no longer resembled a pile of filth molded into the shape of a man, but more like one of his grandmother's stitchlings. He was crudely made, but all the parts were bound together. Somehow, he had forged another collar. Candy was at ease seeing that the nightmares no longer roamed free about his person.

"Ready?" Candy asked.

Carrion nodded. "If you have any second thoughts, speak now. Once we leave here, you are my apprentice and you cannot leave me until I release you."

"Is this because of Boa?"

"I've learned since then."

 

 

They huddled beside one another, waiting for Mama Izabella to bear them away to foreign lands. The evening was warm, but the wind had kicked up, making Candy shiver as it blew through her thin cotton shirt. Rarely had she needed to worry about cold in Abarat, but she found herself wishing that she had grabbed a sweater before departing for strange hours of the day. Looking around the boat, she realized that neither of them had really prepared to go out into the wilds. They had no food, no water, and they would have to sleep out beneath the stars once they reached the Yebba Dim Day.

"I could have planned this better," Candy mumbled.

Carrion looked cold as well. She wasn't sure how, considering he seemed to be only skin and bones and a smattering of magic to hold him together.

"What will we do once we reach the Yebba Dim Day?"

Carrion, who had been watching the ocean, turned to look at her. It still unsettled her to look in his eyes. Since she and Boa had been parted, Candy found herself lacking in some essential confidence. She found it easier to trust him now, but it was more difficult to look him in the eyes. It seemed Boa had dulled her to some of the pain in his eyes.

"We'll go inland. On foot, of course. There are abandoned towns in the interior. The houses still stand. In some of them, there are still crops growing. Are you ready?"

"Of course. Will there be anyone there?"

"I cannot say. The people say that the far side of the island is cursed and haunted and tend to stay away, but some may have fled there during the destruction."

They fell into silence.

"Are you nervous about teaching me?" Candy asked. He seemed uncomfortable around her. It was funny to think that the prince of midnight, a powerful man who knew so much of Abaratian magic was uncomfortable around her.

"Not about teaching you, no."

"Then what is it?"

Carrion considered. He fidgeted a moment, reminding her of the boys she had gone to school with as they tried to talk to girls they obviously liked. She tried not to laugh at him.

"You look like her."

"Like Boa?"

"Who else?" Carrion asked, slightly terse.

“Rest easy. I promise that I’m not her.”

He seemed not to take the jab well, looking out over the ocean again. If he had been someone else, Malingo or one of the Johns or even Gazza, she would have put and arm around his shoulders to comfort him. As things stood between them, she didn’t know quite how to respond, and so Candy stayed silent.

“You look like her, but you are very different. You’ve never been cruel in your life, have you?”

He looked to her. His eyes had become defined again. They were the same clear, almost unnatural, blue.

Candy didn’t answer.

“You don’t have the same presence as her,” he continued. “Someone without strong magic wouldn’t be able to feel it, but I can. If it were anyone else in all of Abarat and the Hereafter you resembled, it would not be such a problem.”

“Will it be a problem?”

“I cannot let it prevent me from teaching you what you must know.”

He still loved Boa, no matter what she she done to him. His heart was broken and the passage of time had not healed it or dulled the pain. She hoped that he could move beyond it. Even someone such as he didn’t deserve to suffer for loving Boa. Candy didn’t know what she could do to help him.

And so they sat together on the deck, cold and impatient to reach their destination. They watched in silence as the stars appeared as the floated toward the Yebba Dim Day.


End file.
